


Playing Pretend

by hoosierbitch



Series: Trust and Consequence (the kink meme series) [1]
Category: White Collar
Genre: BDSM, Consent Issues, Dubious Consent, M/M, Paddling, Whipping, dub-con, general BDSM play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-16
Updated: 2010-02-16
Packaged: 2017-10-09 00:35:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/81109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoosierbitch/pseuds/hoosierbitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter and Neal go undercover in a sex club, and are forced to perform a BDSM scene.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Playing Pretend

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to themkshrine for the original prompt, and for the lovely feedback!

Edwards was a loan shark. A good one, one who was discreet with his clients and clever with his funds and had an estimated seven-hundred thousand dollars of government money tucked away, hidden and laundered behind the facade of his night-club. They'd gone in expecting to scout the turf, hidden cameras on Peter's leather coat clicking away. It was a--a fetish club, Neal had called it, with a small secretive grin. He'd taken it upon himself to dress them both, selecting leather ensembles that had Peter rolling his eyes and Cruz in fits of laughter.

Jones and the team were on orders to come in after them if they failed to check in every forty-five minutes (the ambient noise in the club, and its position underneath a warehouse interfered with the comms). When they'd made it inside--Peter paying the hefty entrance fees--Neal quickly pulled them into a hidden nook off to the side. He slipped off his coat, and his t-shirt, and before Peter could protest Neal clipped a leash onto what Peter had thought was a necklace, but upon closer inspection turned out to be a collar--and handed the end of the leash to Peter.

"If we don't want to look like tourists, we need to fit in. This way, no one will be looking at you." Peter was forced to agree with him, given the way his own eyes were fixed on Neal's pale skin, the curve of his neck, the black leather tight around it. "I know what I'm doing. Just--just don't look at me too much, alright? I don't want Cruz to have too much blackmail material when this is over."

Belatedly, Peter covered the camera lens hidden on his jacket with the hand not holding the leash. "Shit, sorry--"

Neal grinned and pushed his hand back down. "It's fine. Just start walking. Hold onto the leash and pretend I'm not here. I'd tell you to pretend I'm Satch, but I'm much better at heeling than he is."

Peter swallowed his shocked protests (and a small smile, remembering walking Satchmo with Neal, laughing as Satch bullied Neal around) and they made their way inside the club, the leather in his hand already slick with sweat.

They'd made the rounds relatively easily. Two people had asked Peter if his pet was available for hiring out, or for sharing--one had asked when they'd be going into the 'back rooms'--Peter had muttered "later" and pulled Neal, perhaps a bit too forcefully, to the bar. "Jesus," he sighed, "these people have no manners." He texted an all-clear to Jones, and turned to talk to Neal only to realize that his partner wasn't standing beside him. He was kneeling at Peter's feet.

He mouth was still hanging open when two guards came up beside him and hauled them into a back room. There, sitting in a veritable throne, was Edwards. He stayed silent as the guards searched them, a bit too thoroughly for Peter's taste. When they were finished Edwards waved closer, the silver of the pistol in his hand catching in the dim light.

"You've got Neal Caffrey on a leash," Edwards observed, with a lazy drawl. Neal attempted to cover his suprise, but not very well. "Oh, yes, I know who you are. Thief. Forger. Conman. And now in my club. Here to steal from me, pretty little jailbird?" Neal lowered his eyes and said nothing.

"He's not a thief," Peter said, doing his best to look intimidating and not like an annoyed dad--Neal'd been giving him acting lessons--"he's mine."

"Really," Edwards drawled. "Prove it."

"Prove--prove what," Peter spat out, "how?"

"Prove that he's yours. That you're his master. That you've got him under control--firm enough control that I know he won't do anything without your consent. And do it hard enough that I'll know, when you're finished, that even if you do order him to steal from me, he wouldn't be capable of it. Your other option is a bullet between the eyes."

Neal was pressed close enough against his side that Peter felt him shake.

"No. Absolutely not. He's not a--" Neal shut down his protest with a soft kiss behind his ear. Peter, still reeling from the whole situation, silently watched as Neal slid gracefully to his knees.

Neal, Peter is not proud to report, looked even better out of his suits than in them. The pale arch of his rib cage, heaving as he knelt by Peter's side, is the most beautiful human architecture Peter'd seen since he first ran callused fingers over Elizabeth's breasts and heard her moan. Neal's shoulder blades are sharp and Peter knew he could cover them with his hands--Neal's not a small man, but he's lean, and curled in on himself and submissive Peter knew he could make him do whatever he wanted.

He hooked his fingers under Neal's collar and hauled him back up, none too gently. Neal's breath hitched--which Peter could feel, with Neal's wiry body pressed against him--and Peter had cause to curse the fit of the leather pants which pressed his growing erection tight against his body.

He shook Neal again and pulled him close to whisper in his ear. "If you want out, now's the time. Back-up'll be here within an hour." He knew their odds. Neal could probably calculate them to the tenth decimal place. But Peter couldn't do this without hearing it from Neal. Sellfishly, he needed Neal to be okay with it before he hurt him.

Edwards looked at them both with either lust or anger (or, perhaps, both) burning in his eyes. He had a young woman standing behind him, her breasts bound tight with rope, the weights on her nipples swinging as she massaged her master's shoulders. A young man with drugged eyes was kneeling in front of him, sucking on his cock, barely aware enough to protest as he gagged repeatedly. Edwards had his gun pointed at the boy's head, but he slowly brought it to bear on Neal.

"Tell them to tie me to the cross," Neal whispered hurriedly in his ear. "Use a paddle, they're easy. A whip or flogger if you've used one before. Make me bleed. It's okay. I promise. I'll be fine." Peter, who could barely feel the fine trembles coursing through Neal's torso, was sickeningly grateful that Neal was a good liar. This was swiftly becoming his least favorite case of all time.

"Fine," Peter said loudly. "I'll show you how I make him beg." He surveyed the room and saw the dark wooden contraption that must be the cross. "Tie him to the cross," he ordered the guards, trying to sound like he knew what he was talking about. "You want to show me what my options are?" He asked, turning back to Edwards.

"Lily, show the nice man the toys." The woman--Lily--stopped her massage and led Peter to a chest behind Edwards' throne. "Johnson, Darnell--take the pants off before you tie his feet. Idiotic neanderthals..." Peter resolutely did not look back to see his partner being stripped by two strange men. He knew he wouldn't have been able to do it himself. Knew he was subjecting Neal to unnecessary rough handling and humiliation, but just didn't think he'd have been able to do it himself.

There were toys in this chest that Peter recognized. Vibrators, strap-ons, dildos. And then there were contraptions of metal and leather and ribbed plastic and glass that Peter couldn't figure out how they were related to pleasure in any way. He grabbed a paddle, and, after a moment of hesitation, a whip. He'd spent all four summers during high school on a horse farm. He knew how tricky they were to handle, how hard it was to inflict damage properly (how easy it was to do it incorrectly and inflict too much). He figured it would help convince Edwards of the lie.

When he turned, he saw Neal hanging on the cross. It wasn't a proper Christian cross (thank God, pun intended), but an X shape. Neal was spread-eagled across it. He was naked except for the collar, low enough on his neck that it wasn't hidden by the sweat-dampened curls of his hair. His tracker had been removed before they entered the club, only to be replaced now by thick bands of black leather.

His weight seemed to be hanging almost entirely from his wrists. Peter wanted to protest, it couldn't be comfortable--but didn't want to be caught-out if that was how it was supposed to work.

His cock jumped at the sight of Neal laid out like a present for him. He cursed himself, hated himself, knew that this was wrong on so many levels. But god help him if he didn't want Neal, the whole impossible contradiction of him, wanted him so badly it hurt, so badly he wanted (in his heart which he knew now was twisted) to make Neal hurt, too.

"Make it a good show," Edwards said with a laugh, and Peter nodded.

He hefted the black leather paddle in his hand and realized too late that it was studded. Lines of silver circles that would bite into Neal's flesh, bruise it in patterns of Peter's devising, and he swung it hard before he lost his nerve.

Neal did not scream. Not at first.

Peter hit him. Over and over and over. He concentrated on the left side, first, giving Edwards a clear view. Until it was bright red and then harder, and harder, until it was purple and bruised and Neal was tense all over.

Then he switched sides. It took longer, to acheive the same color, swinging with his left hand. But he saw how raptly Edwards was watching, knew he'd be able to stretch this out longer if he kept Edwards engaged. He'd lost track of time. Forty-five minutes, he kept thinking to himself, ignoring the fact that it would take time to organize the team and authorize their entry and find them in this dark, hidden back room.

So Peter took his time. He started at the top of Neal's ass and worked his way methodically down, until he was smacking Neal's thighs, hitting the bottom of his ass with every upswing, making the bruised flesh jiggle in a mockery of movement.

At first, Neal jumped with every hit. Then he was just tense, trying to hold still, sweat pouring down his back.

When Peter starting laying hits across his whole backside, covering it evenly, trying to line up the silver studs into dark, even lines on the once-pale flesh, Neal began to struggle.

He had no leverage on the cross. He was helpless. His wrists were bound securely, the locks beyond the reach of his long, nimble fingers. Every time he moved his legs, kicking at the wood beams or back at Peter, Peter hit him.

He had never been harder before in his life.

He had never felt so very powerful before.

Neal Caffrey, the brilliant man who had run so cleverly from him, and after his capture so delightfully around him, was at his mercy.

Peter stepped up close behind him and ran the paddle between Neal's legs. Up the insides, to press against his balls, between the cheeks of his ass. He pressed himself against Neal, grabbed his head and turned it so he could kiss the cries out of his convict's mouth.

He told himself it was to make sure Neal was okay. To make eye contact, to ask him if he knew how long before Jones arrived, to put on a better show for Edwards--but then Neal writhed against him, pressing his tortured flesh against Peter's cock, and Peter snuck a hand between Neal and the cross to hold the hot, dripping length of Neal Caffrey.

"Enough with the touching romance," Edwards snarled from behind them. "You've got a whip. Use it."

Neal closed his eyes and turned away but as he did so, he nodded. Peter held his cock as gently as he could, feeling the precum drip out of it with every twitch of his hips against Neal's ass. "I'm so sorry, Neal," he said, which made Neal's face break open, impossibly vulnerable, improbably--sad. "So sorry it had to happen like this."

He stroked Neal one last time before stepping back. He set the paddle down on the floor, and picked up the whip. It was about three feet in length, three strips of braided leather coming out of the handle, all of them tipped with barbs of metal.

His hands shook, and he took a moment to breathe deeply, to settle his nerves. He knew he had to do this right. He swung the whip through the air a few times. Neal's blue eyes, bright with tears, followed its arc. Peter swung it once more, making sure the weight felt comfortable in his palm (like the leash, his inner voice--that sounded disturbingly like Elizabeth--supplied).

He ran his hands across Neal's back before he started.

"He's a clean canvass," Edwards mused. "You don't play this hard at home?"

"No," Peter responded. "My wife prefers I keep these things to a minimum."

Edwards laughed. "So you come into a club to play with your pretty new pet--did you know who he was? Did you know he's a famous thief? Or did you just like his face? His lips? Maybe that ass of his, that you've treated so nicely."

"Yeah," Peter replied, voice hoarse. "I know who he is."

The whip whistled in the air before wrapping around Neal's torso. It was not a precise swing and the tips cut into the tender skin stretched over his ribs, under his arm. It raised red lines but did not draw blood. Peter adjusted his stance.

He varied the pace. Kept Neal guessing. He didn't know how it felt--he'd never been whipped--but from the way Neal screamed through clenched teeth he could imagine how it burned. He got the hang of it around the third swing and after that every strike drew three points of blood, silver barbs at the end of each welt pulling out cries and skin as Peter pulled his arm back.

He waited until Neal was sobbing openly before he aimed for his ass. When he hit it, with all three tails, all three barbs, Neal's whole body jerked. There was a split second of silence before he yelled, a short desperate thing that sounded like no. The ensuing whimpers sounded like please, and they trickled out of him with each new trail of blood that mingled with his sweat, to drip slowly down the lean lines of him.

"I think he's finished," Peter said, after he landed two more hits directly on Neal's thighs, reducing him to a constant stream of stop, Peter, please.

"I think you're right," Edwards agreed from behind him. The click of his gun and the sound of Jones' voice calling out "FBI!" came at the same moment.

"What the hell," Edwards spat, pushing away the young man who was still sucking his cock. He strode closer, gun stretched before him, and Peter rushed him. The first shot went wild as Peter tackled him to the ground, but hopefully would be enough to draw Jones' attention in the right direction. Edwards wasn't going down without a fight, and he landed blow after blow to Peter's head and shoulders before the bodyguards pulled them apart, one of them wrapping a thick arm around Peter's throat right as the door burst open.

Peter had never been happier to see someone than he was to see Lauren Cruz, gun outstretched, looking like a god of wrath, screaming at the guards to drop him or, god help her, she would shoot them dead.

They guards surrendered, outnumbered (as agent after agent filled the doorway) and out-gunned. Edwards did not go easily. He still had his gun, and after a desperate lunge, held the naked woman--Lily--in front of him like a shield.

"I'm either going to walk out of this club," he said evenly, "or I'm going to shoot this woman in the head. It's up to you."

"Not going to happen," Lauren replied. "Drop the gun."

Peter was trying to figure out what the best angle was to tackle the man when Lily--the pretty blond woman whose breasts were red and raw where the rope squeezed and rubbed against them, the weights on her nipples betraying every nervous breath, threw her head back and broke Edwards' nose. In the ensuing confusion, Peter managed to pull her free and give Edwards a firm knee to the groin.

Lauren and Cruz were there a second later, pulling him away even as he tried to hit him again. "Go to Neal," Jones said to him. "We've got Edwards."

Peter rocked back on his heels and looked over to where too many solicitous FBI agents surrounded the cross, almost blocking Neal from view. "Get away from him," he bellowed, pushing them away. "Somebody get me the keys or a knife, right fucking now! And then clear the goddamn room."

One of the bodyguards offered the key up quickly. Peter waited as the room emptied, leaving only Jones and Cruz still inside and ready to help. Neal couldn't support his own weight. Peter unlocked the cuffs around his ankles, first, then let Jones get his wrists. The leather bonds hadn't broken the skin but his hands and feet were discolored from lack of circulation and bruised from his struggle.

He fell off the cross and into Peter's arms, with a strangled cry as his back made contact with Peter's chest. Peter stumbled backwards and ended up on the floor. Jones helped him sit up, leaning against Edwards' throne. "Paramedics are en route," Cruz said quietly.

"I--I'm sorry, I can't do this, I need to--" Jones left the room quickly. Peter could hear the echoes of him retching in the hallway.

"Cruz," Peter said, as calmly as he could, "could you please leave us alone?" She gave him a long look, and then turned to Neal.

"Neal? Are you okay being alone in here with Peter?" He nodded. "I'll be right outside the door if you need anything. Either of you," she said, with a small, helpless smile to Peter.

When she left, Peter gently, as gently as he could, turned Neal towards him. He'd bitten through his lip at some point, it was swollen and bloody, and his eyes were red from crying. "Oh, Jesus, Neal," Peter choked out. "I'm so, so sorry."

"Peter," Neal said, voice almost too soft to hear, "could you--could you clean me up before the paramedics get here?"

"I don't want to make the bleeding any worse," Peter replied, but Neal shook his head.

"Not that--I, uh. I'm afraid I may have come. While you were, um."

Peter looked down and saw the stripes of semen spread across Neal's stomach. "Oh." He looked around, but there were no cloths or tissues around. "I can ask Cruz to get something--"

"No," Neal interrupted. "Never mind. It doesn't matter."

Peter reached a hesitant hand towards Neal's cock. "Do you--is it okay if I--if I touch you?"

Neal dropped his head back against Peter's shoulder, breath hot against his ear as he replied. "Please."

He wiped up Neal's cum with nervous fingers, from off his softening cock and the tense muscles of his abdomen. He was about to wipe it on the floor when Neal's fingers, still painfully clumsy, circled his wrist. "Don't," Neal told him. "CSI will find it."

"Okay," Peter replied. There was nothing around them he could use. He couldn't wipe it on his clothes, because they'd be included in the evidence.

"Neal, I know this is an awkward time to ask this, but--do you have any STIs?"

"No. I got tested after I was released."

Peter didn't want to think into the implications of that statement. Not then, not with Neal spent and weak and in his arms. So instead he just brought his fingers--Neal's fingers still circling his wrist--up to his mouth, and licked the taste of Neal Caffrey off his skin.

"Jesus, Peter," Neal moaned. "You kiss Elizabeth with that mouth?"

"Yes," Peter replied, licking his lips and lowering his arm.

"She's a lucky woman," Neal said quietly.

Peter didn't say anything. Just held Neal against him and thought about the taste of Neal on his tongue. The sight of Neal spread out before him. The power he'd felt with the leash in his hand.

"If you want," Peter said softly, "after you heal and see a therapist and get some distance from all this--if you want, after that, you can come over and see for yourself."

Peter could feel Neal's eyelashes as he blinked, head still cradled against the curve of Peter's shoulder.

"This?" Neal replied, voice soft and hoarse and just for Peter, "is officially my favorite case ever."


End file.
